


Four First Kisses Mohinder and Sylar Could Have Shared, and One They Never Will

by speccygeekgrrl



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-10-06
Updated: 2009-10-06
Packaged: 2017-10-02 12:39:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speccygeekgrrl/pseuds/speccygeekgrrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four almost-canon first kiss scenarios, and one that's entirely impossible.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Four First Kisses Mohinder and Sylar Could Have Shared, and One They Never Will

**Author's Note:**

> A gift fic for Perdiccas.

**1\. Sweet**

Mohinder suggests that Zane might want to grab some snacks when they make the first stop for gas since leaving Virgina Beach. While he fills up the car, his mind wanders ahead to the highways and back roads, tolls and traffic jams, isolated motels they'll be seeing over the next few days. It takes thirty-six hours of optimal driving conditions from Zane's home to Dale Smither's, and that doesn't account for the snow that's been beating down the Midwest. Even in the best case, it'll take three days for them to get to Montana.

He hopes that Zane won't mind switching off driving with him. Bad enough that they'll be in the car the whole time; if Mohinder has to pay attention to the road for 36 hours, it'll be worse than painful.

"I hope you like coffee," Zane's soft voice interrupts Mohinder's thoughts, and he waves a cup when Mohinder glances over his shoulder. "I know you've been driving a while already."

"Thank you, Zane. That's very thoughtful." Replacing the pump handle, closing the gas cap, Mohinder thinks that he's lucky that his unexpected companion is a nice person-- a little weird, yes, but nice.

By the time they hit the Virginia border, Mohinder realizes a few more things about Zane: no matter how far back he pushes the seat his legs are still too long to get comfortable, he fidgets when the radio goes to commercials until Mohinder lets him flip stations at will, he's either very quick to pick up on anything Mohinder talks about or he fakes it very well, and he has a sweet tooth. Correction: Zane has several sweet teeth, to the point where almost everything he's pulled out of his snack bag is candy. He favors fruity candies: bright-colored Life Savers that click against his teeth when he talks, Skittles that leave little stains on his wide pale palms, Starburst in wrappers that he folds into shapes, tiny triangles and squares and the smallest origami crane Mohinder has ever seen.

"Are you sure?" he asks, every time Mohinder turns down an offered bit of candy, until his earnest brown eyes seem like more of a reason than Mohinder's dislike of artificial fruit flavoring. When Mohinder pops the Life Saver past his lips, he looks away, but Mohinder can feel Zane watching him steadily for the next ten minutes-- watching his mouth.

They talk and lapse into silence organically; Zane lightly makes fun of Mohinder's taste in music, Mohinder mocks Zane's favorite movies, Mohinder talks about genetic theory and Zane asks questions, and in between they pretend not to glance at each other. Zane acts like he isn't fascinated by Mohinder's profile. Mohinder stares at Zane's hands and pays the bare amount of attention to the open road. The sun's already set by the time a motel shows on the horizon.

"I'll get the room if you order pizza," Zane offers when they park, and Mohinder's too tired to argue about paying half like he thinks he should. He moves the car, following Zane's long legs to the right door, and when he gets out and shivers in the chilly night Zane is right there beside him.

"Thank you for coming with me. This would have been a terrible drive without company." Zane's eyes flash with reflected light, and he smiles as he leans closer to Mohinder.

"Thank you for bringing me," he says softly, spreading one warm hand along Mohinder's jaw and leaning down-- cautious, slow, giving Mohinder a chance to back away-- before brushing their lips together. Mohinder moves closer, knots his hands in Zane's coat, and tastes strawberry, cherry, lime, orange, sweetness on Zane's tongue.

**2\. Salty**

"Don't worry. You might actually do some good before you die. Starting with that list." Sylar steps closer to Mohinder, deadly grace, deadly smile. "Or perhaps starting easier?"

Mohinder can't move. His muscles clench and loosen, but his body goes nowhere; all he can move are his eyelids, and he isn't brave enough to watch death grinning as it comes near.

"Come now, Mohinder. You didn't have such a problem looking at me just a day ago." The voice that had broken in a scream so recently is now sandpaper over silk, a mocking attempt at the gentler tones of his facade as Zane. Sylar's breath skims over Mohinder's cheek, hot and bitter, and a thumb follows its trail, pressing flesh hard into bone. "Look at me, damn you!"

"I can't," Mohinder whimpers, failing to pull away from that harsh caress. "I won't."

"You will," Sylar growls, and Mohinder does, eyes opening against his will, held like that with a delicate telekinetic touch. "Oh, stop. I'm not going to cut open your head. There's nothing in there that interests me." He flashes a brief twisted smile, threading a hand into Mohinder's hair to yank it sharply, and presses his mouth against the vulnerable dark throat. "I do plan on torturing you, but at least your pretty little head will be intact when they find your body."

Terrified doesn't begin to describe Mohinder's state of mind when teeth close on his skin. He bites the inside of his cheek to keep from making any sound, anything that would give the madman assaulting him the least satisfaction.

"Stubborn. Just like your father." Sylar pulls back, scanning Mohinder's tense frame, listening to the pound of his frantic heartbeat. "But so much prouder. Do you know how he begged me to stop? You're too dignified for that, aren't you." Both hands framing Mohinder's face, Sylar draws him closer, pausing barely a breath away, his nose almost brushing Mohinder's. "I'm going to rip that dignity out by the roots before I let you die."

When he forces his tongue into Mohinder's mouth, Sylar tastes iron, salt, and triumph.

**3\. Bitter**

"Maya makes the most incredible chilaquiles." Sylar smiles over Mohinder's shoulder to the little Latina woman standing at Mohinder's stove, just one more bemusing piece in the incomprehensible puzzle of Mohinder's morning. "Now, before breakfast, I'd like to speak with you alone, _Doctor_."

The sole reason Mohinder goes with Sylar into his bedroom is the knowledge (fervent hope, at least) that Sylar wouldn't murder him with an innocent person in the kitchen. He's assuming that Molly is safe, that whoever that woman is wouldn't condone hurting a little girl. "What do you want," he hisses as soon as the door closes behind Sylar's back.

"Oh, Mohinder, can't you be more civil to an old friend? It's been months, after all." Sylar leans back against the door casually, watching Mohinder pace next to his bed. "I know we didn't part on the best of terms, but I'm trying to make amends of a sort."

"Of what sort would those be?" Mohinder snaps, whirling at the end of his line; he stumbles when Sylar is right there behind him, looming and wearing a smile that looks pasted on.

"Any kind you'll accept," Sylar says pleasantly, and swoops down to catch Mohinder's lips with his own. Their tongues touch with the bitterness of coffee between them, Sylar's cut with artificial sweetener, Mohinder's black and strong like he takes it on long, long nights. It takes Mohinder a moment too long to push Sylar away, staggering the taller man back against the door.

"Not accepted," Mohinder spits, "Now get out of my way." After a long, calculating look, Sylar does just that.

**4\. Sour**

Sylar doesn't know why he's surprised when Mohinder Suresh attacks him in the laboratory of Pinehearst. Of course the good doctor would be wherever fate led Sylar to be; it seemed as if they'd never be free of each other. The last time the three of them had been in a room, their roles had been much different: Mohinder the one held helpless, Sylar the one playing mad scientist, Peter the unwitting interloper. _What a bizarre turn of events_, Sylar thinks as he unstraps Peter from the gurney. "Let's get out of here."

Mohinder is a surprising weight, bearing him to the floor before Sylar can react. His head slams off the floor, and there's just enough time to think _Suresh has been working out?_ before unconsciousness claims him. He regenerates, just long enough to hear Peter yell, "Leave him alone!" Then Mohinder pounds his head against the floor again.

The next time Sylar opens his eyes, Mohinder is still crouched over him, panting and furious, while a man who could only be Arthur Petrelli is speaking. "...my son. And I've been waiting for him." Interesting. He plays dead for a moment longer, until Mohinder starts to get up, and then he wraps a hand around his ankle and tugs the scientist to the floor. Mohinder's reflexes are inhuman, just like the strength with which he assaulted Sylar, and when the scales on his arm catch the light Sylar understands-- of course he'd try to create abilities, and of course it wouldn't go right. Nothing Mohinder does goes entirely right.

"Good to see you're all right," Arthur says dryly, "Now come on, Gabriel."

"One moment." Sylar is gratified to see that Mohinder still shrinks away when he approaches, even with his new abilities. "It's good to see you, too," he says. Mohinder scowls, is too startled to move when Sylar lifts him slightly and kisses him just off-center, a dry rasp of chapped lips. "Did you know I'm Italian? It was news to me. But I suppose that the kiss of death is appropriate as well as suitably dramatic."

"You're insane," Mohinder breathes. Sylar can only laugh.

"Anything you say, Doctor Jekyll. Let me know how things turn out if you live long enough to become Mr. Hyde."

**0\. Bittersweet**

"I'm not sure whether to congratulate you or express my sympathies." Gabriel had been far too distracted to hear anyone approach, but he didn't startle at the voice which echoed through the wide viewing room of the funeral parlor.

"Either way you decide, do it quietly. He only fell asleep a few minutes ago." The chair to his left was occupied with a baby carrier; the one on his right shifted as Mohinder sat down, studying the tiny drooling baby bundled in Gabriel's arms.

"So it's true. I wasn't sure if Matt had heard correctly." The semicircle of coffins arranged at the front of the room felt momentous, like Stonehenge or the Sphinx, something ancient and defunct and over. Peter had been the first to die, still stupidly brave without his powers to back his intentions; Nathan had killed Arthur moments later, but not before Arthur had made one final desperate burst of stolen power, the same one that had nearly killed all of his sons at one point: radiation flooded the building, incinerating Nathan and Angela and a handful of others who had been fighting through in yet another attempt to end the battle of one misguided side versus another once and for all.

"I don't think anyone would lie about the last Petrelli standing. Not with the damage we've done." Gabriel gently jiggled the baby when he started fussing in his sleep. "Although I'm not the last any more... I'm not going to raise him as a Petrelli. The universe is a sadistic place... all I wanted to do was be special, and all I want for my son is for him to be normal." Glancing at Mohinder over the rim of his glasses, Gabriel sighed. "I know you're here for something you couldn't express with a Hallmark card. What is it, Mohinder?"

"I--" Mohinder pulled his eyes away from the baby's peaceful face, his shoulders slumping. "I wanted to see you, Gabriel, that's all. There are so few of us left who've made it through this whole..." He waved one hand, no words fully encompassing the tangled web that had woven so many lives together and cut so many short. "I wanted to be sure you were all right. And meet your son, since that rumor is true."

"I'm still alive," Gabriel said simply, "and as long as he is, I have to be. Motherless is bad enough, I won't leave him an orphan." The weight of the room bore down on them, set silence like a blanket to cover the former foes and the blameless child. Wordless, Mohinder set a hand on Gabriel's shoulder, and they both watched the infant sleep.

"What's his name?" Mohinder finally asked, when it seemed like the father would join his son in a nap.

"Noah." Gabriel bit his lip, running a finger across his baby's plump cheek. "Noah Brian Gray." All Mohinder could do was nod. It made sense that Gabriel Gray, of all people, would make his reason for living a constant reminder of his previous transgressions. "How are you doing? I was afr-- concerned that you'd been caught in the Pinehearst incident." He lifted his chin toward the coffins, all of his traitorous family laid out for respects to be paid. "We're still not sure how many died."

"I've heard anywhere from eleven to forty-five." Mohinder's hand was still on Gabriel's arm; he slowly drew it down until his fingers lay on the soft baby blanket. "I'm... not sure, honestly. I don't know what to do with myself. All my research is gone, so many friends are gone..."

"It's almost like you could reinvent yourself, if you wanted to," Gabriel said quietly, his arms tightening around Noah. "Go somewhere you don't feel the need to look over your shoulder every second of every day."

"Almost, yes." Mohinder's gaze was steady on Gabriel. "I don't think I could do it alone. Live with what I know and have to pretend that everything is just as most people think it is."

"Mm." Gabriel kept his eyes on his son, until the baby began to fuss in earnest, shaking his head and beginning to cry. "Oh-- oh, Noah, shh. I got you." Quick and careful and entirely without asking, Gabriel set Noah into Mohinder's arms and reached over to fish a bottle from a baby bag. "Shhh, it's okay."

Nearsighted baby eyes blinked, and Noah quieted down, waving a chubby hand up at Mohinder's face. "Hello, Noah," Mohinder said, leaning over to observe; the infant had his mother's facial structure, her fair hair, but his father's ears and chin and dark eyes. "I'm Mohinder. It's a pleasure to meet you." Noah managed to get a handful of curls despite his deficit of fine motor skills, and the scientist let him tug, bending his head to accommodate being used as a toy.

"You shouldn't let him do that," Gabriel said, hiding a laugh under his words. "He'll get used to pulling hair, and then he'll be insufferable and I'll never be able to find a babysitter." He carefully disengaged Noah's hand from Mohinder's hair and plopped the bottle into Noah's mouth.

"I wish I could watch him for you," Mohinder answered, thoughtlessly automatic. Gabriel's spine stiffened, and Mohinder winced, holding the baby closer to his chest reflexively. "I mean... Gabriel. I'm..." He shook his head. "I'm glad you're alive and all right. And that I got to see you one last time." He was surprised when a big hand closed around his wrist, Gabriel's eyes angry behind his glasses.

"As if I can't recognize a goodbye when it's being waved in my face. You don't get to do this, Mohinder. You don't get to be the only one to care and then go kill yourself as if it won't make a difference." Gabriel drew Mohinder in by his shoulders, careful about Noah between them, and sought out Mohinder's lips almost desperately. Gabriel kissed like he was furious; Mohinder kissed like he was drowning, like a last-ditch effort at reaching air. One arm snaking up into Mohinder's hair, Gabriel's other arm curled between them, keeping Noah safe and supported, hanging on to everything worth living for all at once. "You have to stay. At least a little while. Please."

Mohinder's eyes were shining and wet when Gabriel tipped his chin up, searching out his gaze. "I was hoping..." He shook his head, giving up on words, and arched his neck for another kiss.


End file.
